First Homestay In Hovsgol

The first day of my extensive home stay began with a trip back to the Chinggas Khaan international airport. The Mongolian version of “America’s Got Talent” was playing on the T.V. in the waiting room, and I believe the 80 year old beat-boxer may have the best chance of winning. We flew a little 30 person propeller plane on Eznis airlines, which only serves domestic flights in Mongolian and is owned by some Belgian company. The best part of this airline was matching everything from the upholstery to the cups to the flight attendants sweater that were all in the Texas Longhorns burnt orange color. On an hour long flight we still manages to get cheese, crackers and a pastry (God, I love foreign airlines). We arrived at the absolute smallest airport (two rooms) in the town of Muran. We were met by three Russian vans that unbelievably drove us off into the steppe at night with no lights and no roads. The drivers went for almost an hour through land that looked exactly the same lit by only headlights and managed to find our ger camp. Before bed, we all just stared at the stars because you could see everything (I could see the Milky Way for the first time from the ground and it was so clear in the sky). We were staying in a tourist camp, which was given away by the enormous beds (the only ones that I’ve fit in so far). The real adventure begins tomorrow.

The next day we drove all day north to get closer to the valley that houses our home stay. We stopped to see deer stones along the way. Deer stones are 3000 year old carved stones that are all over the Mongolia countryside. The stones stand three to eight feet high and generally include carvings of the sun and, of course, deer. They are highly religious sites for shamanic practitioners and were likely prayed to for a good hunting season or protection during the hunting season. We spent the night camping in national protected area (which are protected… but people can still live in the area to follow the nomadic lifestyle). I wrote this journal entry by firelight as I listened to some interesting stories around the campfire. One of the stories was about my host family: apparently my host father’s father was a shaman. This shaman at the age of 88 told his wife that his time had come for one last ritual in which he should not be talked to, disturbed or touched. As the ceremony began, the shaman ascended through the hole in the ger, but the shaman’s wife against his request had to touch him one last time before he left. Reaching out, she touched his foot and he immediately fell to the ground. Angered the shaman told his wife that the gods were now angry and would not take him away. As a result the shaman apparently lived to the127 years old.

We didn’t get many other stories out of our director, but we did get to experience the epic dislike of the Chinese that Mongolians have. This point was made clear to us when we asked about ghosts in Mongolian culture. Ghosts are souls that did not make it to the next world and are condemned to be here for doing something bad, but as we were told all ghosts are Chinese because the Chinese are so greedy. Mongolians love to take shots at the Chinese for everything, and our conversation about the Chinese gymnasts at the Olympics was hilarious. Another thing that I found humorous was that Mongolians appear to resell the overstock clothing from the rest of the world. For instance, Baagana, our language coordinator, is in his late 20’s and showed up today wearing a “More Cowbell” t-shirt (he had never seen the SNL skit-he just liked the shirt), a “Land of the Free” belt buckle, and a Discraft hat. Mongolians wear Ohio buckeye, U.S. army, and spurs jerseys without knowing where these shirts come from or what they represent, and the clothing is frequently oversized and appears to just be overstock from the western world (my favorite tee so far has been the 2004 French presidential election shirt).

On the 7th we packed up camp and drove for about an hour to base camp for our home stay. On the way we were informed that we should not wander into the woods because 5 Tuvan raiders had crossed the border illegally to rustle cattle (they apparently killed some scientists about 5 years ago). Remember when I joked about getting a gun to protect myself against raiders…it’s a little too real now. Before we met our host families officially we had to have a horse safety course where I sat on a horse for all of 90 seconds and was told that if a horse won’t move I should stab the ground with a knife or just pee on the horse (feeling really secure about my horse riding skills now). As our host families arrived one-by-one we got our first taste of Horum, which is the top layer of cream that comes from yaks’ milk. This stuff makes heavy cream in the States look like skim milk. They eat it on bread with sugar and it is well worth the impending heart attack. They also fed us cheese that completely lacked flavor (no joke-flavorless cheese…I’m not sure this is a good thing).

After a brief introduction of all the families to their students, I got in my host father’s blue truck (think big Ford Model-T) and drove the short distance to our ger. My ger was five minutes from the river and about a 20 minute walk from the base camp (I was the closest student to base camp). My host mother and my 5 year old host sister were there to greet me when we arrived. Be-yand-baand (this is spelled phonetically for ease-it took me a few hours to get the pronunciation down from the Cyrillic spelling), the little girl, was wearing bright red lipstick and looked her very best when I arrived; I knew this child would be my greatest ally. I was placed on the guest side of the ger (the left side) and given one of the two beds in the entire ger. That first day the family would not even come over to my side, and they kept other guest on the family side of the ger on my behalf I guess. I met my host father’s mother (the wife in the story) and my host mother’s sister who live in the ger next door. I gave my host family some gifts first thing; the tin ornaments of the horse, the boot, the state of Texas and the Alamo were immediately hung above the alter, which is on the north side of the ger. The packet of fennel I brought was also well received, but the packed of chili powder did not fare so well (I’m not sure my host mother had ever seen it before).

I also gave Be-yand-baand a small kite. She and I proceeded to fly kites for the next few hours until she decided it would be more fun for me to chase her around the goat pens until I ran out of breath. Our conversations over several hours ranged from topics of “oh my god, I’m living with nomads” to “no one on the step speaks English”; if Be-yand-baand had any good advice for me I couldn’t understand it, though I don’t think either of us minded. Later I watched my host parents catch a hurt goat (who did not want to be touched) and release him from his recovery pen. I also watched a little news on a black and white T.V. that along with a single light bulb is powered by a solar power. Other things noted on this first evening was the raw sheep meat hanging about two feet from my bed that was used for lunch and dinner (just walk over slice off some meat and cook) and the dried curd on top of the ger or next to the fire place (this is a staple during the winter). As for cooking, there is one stove in the center of the ger that is heated by wood and is used to make everything (and by everything I mean several dishes that all consist of mutton, onions and fat-the diet here is not so varied) including bread, which tastes like mild sourdough. Dinner was traditional buuz, think pot stickers with mutton, and the best part of dinner was that Purev and Naran talked the entire time they made dinner (about what I have no idea, but it was nice).

At dinner, as I learned later, slurping and sucking loudly of food means that you like it and that you are a strong Mongolian, so when Be-yand-baand went to town on the buuz I was a little shocked at first. After dinner I used my phrasebook and my pictures to break the ice with my host family. I learned that my host father is one of nine children and my host mother is one of ten. Also my host father likes folk music that utilizes the horse fiddle. You would think that at this point I would be gaining some valuable Mongolian vocabulary; instead, I found that I was really good at writing English words out phonetically in the Mongolian alphabet, so I taught my host father how to say a few phrases in English. That night my two host brothers, who are 20 and 18, returned home after what I assumed was a long day of herding. That night I went to sleep with the sound of the wind sweeping across the steppe and whipping against the ger (which is made of felt and keeps both the rain and wind out).

And on the 8th day I awoke to find my host father brushing his teeth. Now this is when I realized that I was living with a very progressive herder because not many of the other host families had members with any form of dental hygiene or all their teeth for that matter. It rained the entire day and then it snowed. It was relatively miserable weather because it was so cold, and I pretty much stayed in the ger the entire day. Throughout the course of the day I watched a Chinese film with Mongolian subtitles, got Be-yand-baand to draw some really great stick figures, watched Naran make curd by mixing in sugar to help it dry faster and watched Naran sweep out the ger my collecting twigs and tying them together to make a broom. I also realized that toothpicks are a national commodity; they are in every restaurant and everyone, including my host family, had tons of them (something to pick all the meat out of their teeth).

Today did produce something wonderful today. I found out that my host father plays Durak, a Russian card game and one of the card games I wrote into my Watson proposal. Actually most of the people in the Aimag play Durak, but nowhere else in Mongolia do they play the game. Their version of the game is a bit different from the way I learned, but after losing about 30 games I was off running and playing confidently. The best part is that I learned, played and enjoyed the game with people (both my host brothers also play) who do not speak the same language that I do. This is one of the obstacles I was most afraid of in my Watson proposal, but after experiencing it, I know that my Watson really will work and if I get nominated I will have a great story for my national interview. Playing cards with my host family revealed a lot about them individually and wider Mongolian culture, for instance, they all played the game by slamming their cards down, which may be a testament to the repressed violence that many of us students believe is woven throughout Mongolian culture (wrestling, archery, etc.) My host father played the game very carefully, visibly counting cards and taking time to strategize, as I would expect an educated and intellectual man would. In addition to his playing style my host father would also advise me on how to play cards; by this I mean he would take the cards right out of my hand and play the whole game for me which fit with his dominating persona as the head of household and provider for not only his family but extended family. His sons played the game fast and reckless as you might imagine teenage boys would.

The 9th was filled with card games as I challenged my host family and various guest from around the valley to too many games to count. I also took a three hour hike to what I thought was the closest hill to climb…turns out it took about an hour to just get to the base of the hill, which I subsequently climbed turned around and walked back home (distance on the steppe is deceiving). I helped chop wood when I came back, which Purev found hysterical when I would swing and sheer a tiny piece of wood off instead of chopping a piece in half. I also tried jimis today, which is the Mongolian word for juice but is actually redcurrant berries and is unbelievably sweet. My program coordinator finally showed up at around three in the afternoon and I finally got to have some semblance of a conversation for the first time in 48 hours. I learned that the reason my host brothers were out so late and kept going out for really long periods of time was that our family had lost its horses the first day I arrived, and they were trying to track them down. The end of the day was great because my host brother came and got me to show me five Bactrian (two humped) camels that where roaming the valley. I got up within four feet of these enormous animals. I think I got my best pictures of the trip with these camels against the backdrop of the snow capped mountains; the pictures look completely Photo Shopped.

On the 10th we got a break from our host families and drove north as a group to the Saatan Reindeer Festival. The Saatans are a small group of less than a 1000 people who live a traditional herding lifestyle but only herd reindeer and live in teepees instead of gers for more mobility (however, the teepees are tiny and have not insulation or room for an entire family to live…I don’t know how these people actually survive the winters). The festival was scheduled to begin at 11:00am, which is when we arrived, but like everything else in Mongolia the festival started late, about 4:30pm. It rained the entire time we were there but when the festival started it was worth the wait as we saw performances, song and dance, that were reminiscent of a country fair when the microphone became unplugged for a good chunk of this one girls song. We also got to pet reindeer that stood in the crowd to watch the show just like everyone else. Afterwards we watched a reindeer race, where children raced around a nearby hill and merely had to finish the race to really win (most of them were shaken off or taken in completely different directions by their respective reindeer).

The 11th was a big day. I awoke from some strange and usually creative dreams that seem to be more and more prevalent since I’ve got here and asked my host brothers to let me help them with herding. The younger of the two brothers took me out on horseback. The only help I received was in getting on the horse and then they pretty much left me to my own devices to get the horse to follow my host brother over the river and through the woods, literally. We first stopped to check on some of his cows and then proceeded up a hillside toward what I thought were some goats on the neighboring mountain top. Well it turns out the next mountain top was quite a steep walk that we had to switchback up. At the top I realized that these goats I thought I saw were actually horses. Given that this was my first time on horseback in Mongolia, at the top of a mountain and on a horse that likes to race other horses (all horses in Mongolia are natural race horses and tend to race when they are around one another) I feared for my well being. We proceeded to switchback down the mountain with about 30 horses in the lead, and I did not stand a chance when my horse, who up until now was rather pokey, took off running down the side of the mountain taking my through a bank of trees where I receive a heavy blow to the stomach from a very low branch. I managed to hang on and even go back and retrieve my hat before heading back to camp at a brisk pace (one controlled by the horse not me). After my horse adventure, I went over to Audrey’s (a fellow SIT student) ger and we ended up walking to see another student Amanda who was not feeling well the day before. Amanda ended up not being there, but the walk along the river was nice and Audrey and I were entertained by her 8 year old host brother who, despite a bandaged head, never slowed his wild antics. When I returned to my get there were an entire sheep’s worth of intestines and internal organs boiling in the central pot. They came from the sheep that was to be cooked for my birthday tomorrow and were now hanging next to my bed in four large skinned pieces. I went to bed early because the horse ride had really taken it out of me (it lasted about 4 hours).

Happy 22nd Birthday! I can’t really believe I spent my 22nd birthday in a ger on the Mongolian steppe. My host family prepared all morning for my birthday party. My host father actually fashioned to large wooden benches out of tree logs because there was not enough seating in the ger. All the SIT people arrived along with respective members of their host families to enjoy the celebration. For lunch Hor-hog (spelled phonetically, the traditional Mongolian BBQ if you will where river stones are heated and then placed in a large container with meat and vegetables and some water to pressure cook essentially) was prepared while the guest played charades with Mongolian vocabulary and held a wrestling tournament where all the SIT’s lost within the first two rounds. For the meal we all crowed into the ger where I received the shoulder and breast meat of the sheep (the best parts for the honored guest). During the meal several speeches were given and many folk songs were sung, one by a student in our group. At the end, host father presented my with an offering spoon that had the six major animals of Mongolia carved into it and a sweat scraper for my horse made out of animal bone.

My birthday was a pretty amazing experience, but to top it off…after everyone started to leave the Mongolians took the opportunity of having several men together to walk over to base camp and help the herder there castrate his horses. Not exactly the birthday show I wanted to see; actually it was horrifying. In the States they usually sedate a horse and use sanitary instruments, in Mongolia they have three guys hold a horse down and use a little pocket knife (I don’t want to describe in any more detail because it really was that painful to watch). Mongolians also eat the horse testicles right away for strength. On a lighter note, that evening while I was watching the Mongolian news network I discovered that their theme music is actually the theme music from the Pirates of the Caribbean movie (came as quite a shock after hearing it and getting excited about watching something I actually recognized).

On the 13th, my host father took me out with him on a sacred trek that lasted about six hours on horseback. A little more confident in my horse riding skills we proceeded over the river and through the woods upstream for several miles. The country was beautiful despite being bitterly cold and windy for most of the trip. We stopped for lunch in the middle of a swamp, and my host father with nothing but a knife and a single match created a roaring fire. He, as always, made tea first (not milk tea finally) but with the swamp water that was so disgusting I didn’t believe that even boiling it would kill all the stuff I saw swimming in my cup. I choked all the tea down and he made more mutton and onions, which I ate with a spoon he carved out of wood in about 60 seconds (I was really impressed and kept the spoon). After lunch we climbed to our destination, which was a large ovoo that my host father holds in the highest of spiritual regards. He made several offerings of food and spice and burned pine needles as incense; he also said some prayers and fetched to sheep skulls out of nowhere and placed them on the ovoo. We trekked back after that and ended up watching a wrestling tournament on T.V. The thing about Mongolian wrestling is that there are no rules and no weight classes and the only way to win is to get you opponent to hit the ground first with almost any part of his body (arms are the exception). That night I interviewed my host father via translation from Ulzii, my academic director, about his life and family. Turns out he graduated from school as a veterinary doctor, use to be a mayor of a sum, and is the oldest child in his family, which is why he went back to herding in the early 1990’s (to take care of his family and mother…this responsibility falls to the eldest).

The 14th was my last full day with my host family, and I spent it herding with my host father who had trouble locating both his goats and sheep (this guy really has trouble holding on to his animals). It took several hours to track them down separately and then herd them together. I also chopped some wood and played Durak. Inspired by my host father’s excellent knife skills, I also went down to the river and whittled myself a pair of chopsticks (they are a little short but not bad for a first try).

On the 15th, I walked with my host father and Be-yand-baand to base camp and said goodbye (I managed to write a thank you letter in Mongolian and gave them a picture of myself). My host father invited me back anytime and wanted me to wish mom and John well. Back in the Russian vans we drove all day to Lake Hogsval where we stayed at Garage 24, which is a really nice guest house (it’s named garage 24 because it used to literally be a garage for soviet trucks during the socialist period—numbering is a common staple left over from the socialist time period…the three power plants in UB are named “power plant one, two and three”). Starving and sitting on the porch, several of us students bought smoked fish from a woman in front of the guest house. It was actually really good and definitely dispelled my negative prejudgments about fish in Mongolia. Dinner was excellent and we got yogurt and fresh berries as a late night snack as we sat in front of the fire and talked the evening away.

On the 16th we went to the information center for the lake and learned about the protected areas and efforts to preserve the environment and wildlife. We also walked through the town we were staying in, which is on the southern tip of the lake, and found that all the traditional food that we’ve had so far were made with fish in this little town (and actually tasted pretty good after weeks of nothing but mutton). For luch we had the most amazing shepards pie, which was followed by a language lesson and an lazy afternoon of homework and journaling.

The 17th brought with it a 5 hour horse trek to our next guest house, called the blue pearl, which was right on the water. I named my horse “broken shopping cart” because he always stumbled forward and veered off to the right making me guide him back to the left to stay with the group. That night we played Mafia as a group, though we changed the characters to being Tuvans, herdsmen, a shaman, and a park ranger so that we could have Mafia Mongolia style. The next day we debriefed our home stay and then took what we all thought would be a short hike up to the top of a hill to see a nice view of the lake. In actuality this was a 6 hour round trip hike up a very steep mountain. We all managed to make it to the top, wishing we had brought water. The view was worth it and the wind kept us on our toes. The lake is quite beautiful but my pictures will never do justice to this country’s landscape.